Analysis of The Explanation
Rudyard Kipling 1865 (Mumbai) – 1936 (London)
Love and Death once ceased their strife
At the Tavern of Man's Life.
Called for wine, and threw -- alas! --
Each his quiver on the grass.
When the bout was o'er they found
Mingled arrows strewed the ground.
Hastily they gathered then
Each the loves and lives of men.
Ah, the fateful dawn deceived!
Mingled arrows each one sheaved;
Death's dread armoury was stored
With the shafts he most abhorred;
Love's light quiver groaned beneath
Venom-headed darts of Death.
Thus it was they wrought our woe
At the Tavern long ago.
Tell me, do our masters know,
Loosing blindly as they fly,
Old men love while young men die?
Scheme | AABBCCDDXCEEXX FFFGG |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1011111 1010111 1110101 1110101 10111011 1010101 1001101 1010111 1010101 1010111 11111 1011101 1110101 1010111 11111101 1010101 11110101 1010111 1111111 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 603 |
Words | 112 |
Sentences | 10 |
Stanzas | 2 |
Stanza Lengths | 14, 5 |
Lines Amount | 19 |
Letters per line (avg) | 25 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 239 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 55 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 14, 2023
- 34 sec read
- 115 Views
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"The Explanation" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 3 Jun 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/33423/the-explanation>.
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